This week I read a great blog on starting from scratch or
using old test documentation. The writer formed the blog based on a question
asked by one of his fellow testers, “How can I find old test documentation for
a completed feature so I can re-use those test on a similar new feature?”.
My initial thought was that’s actually not a bad idea, but
the more I read the more I was swayed and started thinking about times when I
was either asked about a similar situation or posed the same question. Though I
wasn’t software testing at the time nor even in the industry this can be
applied to other scenarios as well.
While I do think that it is a good idea to track and refer
to past tests to see what has been done, I agree with the writer that “a
skilled tester can usually come up with better tests…today, from scratch.” He
makes many valid points and I will go over a couple that I thought to me stood
out, you can read the blog to get the rest if you’d like.
- · A skilled tester knows more about testing today than they did last month.
How true. The more you do something the
more you learn about it and the better you become at it.
- The product-under-test is different today than it was last month. It might have new code, refactored code, more users, more data, a different reputation, a different platform, a different time of the year, etc.
As the development process moves through the different iterations, things change. Looking at past tests may help, but more probably than not it will probably slow you down. You have first locate the tests that were done and figure out what the tester was thinking if it wasn’t you, and then try and decide whether or not it even applies to the new code. By the time you figure that stuff out I would imagine you could have written several test cases according to the latest iteration.
- The test environment might be different.
This is true as well, things seemingly change
frequently so you may have changed the environment and once again wasting time
seeing what you or someone else did.
The bottom line here is that while in some cases the old
data may help, but more than likely it will, in my opinion slow you down. One
more thing I think can happen is can stagnate your thought process as you are
looking at old ideas instead of coming up with new ideas.
http://www.testthisblog.com/2016/03/start-from-scratch-vs-old-test.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EricJacobsonSoftwareTestingBlog+%28Test+This+Blog+-+Eric+Jacobson%27s+Software+Testing+Blog%29
http://www.testthisblog.com/2016/03/couple-automated-checks-with-product.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EricJacobsonSoftwareTestingBlog+%28Test+This+Blog+-+Eric+Jacobson%27s+Software+Testing+Blog%29
http://www.testthisblog.com/2016/02/automated-checking-is-very-human.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EricJacobsonSoftwareTestingBlog+%28Test+This+Blog+-+Eric+Jacobson%27s+Software+Testing+Blog%29
http://www.softwaretestingmagazine.com/knowledge/how-to-give-better-code-reviews/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SoftwareTestingMagazine+%28Software+Testing+Magazine%29
http://www.developsense.com/blog/2016/05/testers-dont-prevent-problems/
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